Sony Xperia M2 Aqua brings waterproof tech on a budget (VIDEO)

Sony just announced a new mid-range smartphone that boasts waterproof capabilities on a budget: the new Xperia M2 Aqua.

As the name itself suggests, this is a variant of the mid-tier Sony Xperia M2 smartphone that made its debut earlier this year, sporting the company's popular dust and waterproof certifications.

According to Sony, the new Xperia M2 Aqua boasts the "world's highest level of waterproofing available in a smartphone," and it's also the first smartphone to bring the company's popular waterproof technology to a mid-range device with affordable pricing.

"Xperia M2 Aqua is a significant milestone in our product portfolio as we bring yet another of our signature technologies to a new category of smartphones," touts Calum MacDougall, Director of Xperia Marketing at Sony Mobile. "The popularity of Xperia M2 showed us that there was a huge demand for premium Sony features at an affordable price point. Following consumer feedback, we've now taken this a step further by bringing our waterproof expertise to a mid-range smartphone for the first time with Xperia M2 Aqua. It is a smartphone that lets customers take the best of Sony technology and entertainment with them wherever they go - come rain or shine - and we are excited to bring it to market."

In terms of specifications, the new Sony Xperia M2 Aqua sports a 4.8-inch display with qHD resolution (960 x 540), a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor clocked at 1.2GHz, Adreno 305 graphics, and 1GB of RAM. Other specs include an 8-megapixel Sony Exmor RS rear camera with Sony's smart social camera ecosystem, a 1.1-megapixel front shooter, 8GB of internal storage capacity, microSD support for additional memory of up to 32GB, and a 2,300 mAh battery. On the software side, the handset runs Android 4.4 KitKat out of the box.

The Sony Xperia M2 Aqua comes with IP65/IP68 certification for dust and water-resistance, which is the highest rating for a consumer-grade smartphone. The handset will be available in black and white color options and will hit retail in Latin America, Asia Pacific, and Europe this fall. The company made no mention of U.S. availability, and has yet to disclose pricing details for the Xperia M2 Aqua.

We'll keep you up to date as soon as more information becomes available, but check out the video below in the meantime to see the Sony Xperia M2 Aqua in action.